


Service to the Nation

by beeswaxing



Category: DBSK | Tohoshinki | TVfXQ | TVXQ
Genre: M/M, non-au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-23
Updated: 2017-09-23
Packaged: 2019-01-04 07:55:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,279
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12164718
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beeswaxing/pseuds/beeswaxing
Summary: For the first time in over a decade, TVXQ are forcefully kept apart by their mandatory military service





	Service to the Nation

 

“Don’t think I’m not going to ask about your ribs.”

“It wouldn’t be you if you didn’t ask.”

“And it wouldn’t be you if you didn’t get injured. The doctor better have written a chit excusing you from the march.”

“About that…”

Changmin is up in a flash, storming around the living room, ranting at stupid army doctors, adding a few very colourful and choice words into all the terrible things he is going to do to medical idiots whose degrees aren’t worth the paper they are written on.

It goes on for a good five minutes, Yunho not wanting to interrupt until the younger man runs out of steam, a fond smile on his face, heartened by the other’s concern though he really shouldn’t be because Changmin has always been this way.

However, when the maknae’s words become decidedly bloodthirsty, his threats not at all easing up on their colour or tone, the leader finally speaks up, his voice louder than usual so the other man will listen.

“I asked to be allowed on the march.”

Changmin stops dead, pivoting on his heel to face his leader, eyes flashing dangerously.

“Are you an idiot? Are you trying to kill me?”

—

The couch looks so warm and inviting compared to the cold he has just come in from, and with each step, the lethargy increases. He drops his duffle bag, wincing at the sound of glass coming in contact with the hard floor, only remembering then about the jar of kimchi.

“It’ll be ok…” Yunho mutters to himself for the bottle was from his mother for Changmin. “Yes…” he slurs, stumbling half asleep towards the couch. “It better be ok otherwise he’ll kill me…”

—

It is well past midnight and the chill in the air is at its deepest. Changmin pulls from whatever last reserves of strength that he has to stir from his seat as the van comes to a halt.

“Are you sure? You can come home with me.”

“It’s ok…”

Changmin’s eyes are almost completely closed as he turns towards the speaking man. A man who looks way more awake than he has any right to be. Bright-eyed with a concerned smile, the man gestures to the back of the van at another man totally dead to the world and snoring quietly.

“He’s coming with me. You would be returning to a cold apartment, Changminnie. There’s hot food and a warm bed at my place.”

The youngest shakes his head, opening the door of the van to show just how serious he is. He paused for a second at the mention of hot food, but he remembers the message on his phone.

_**I’ll be home tonight.** _

“No, it’s ok. I’ll be fine. I’ll be warm.”

Siwon’s brow furrows slightly, for the maknae is not making any sense. He knows Changmin is not the type who will leave the heating on in his apartment so he is most assuredly returning to a freezing home.

“Changminnie…”

“It’s warm, it’s warm.” Changmin hops out of the van quickly, suddenly worried that Siwon might make him stay in the van. In his exhaustion, he is not sure if he can fight off the more broadly built man. “It’s always warm at home.”

Siwon is unable to get another word out before the van door is slammed shut in his face.

“Hyung! I think he’s delirious. Bring him back!”

His manager turns from the driver seat, shaking his head. “He’s gone. Security just let him in.”

“Huh?” His apartment doesn’t have security like that.”

The manager turns fully to look at his on-hiatus charge, taking in the too-bright eyes and the flushed cheeks. Siwon is more gone than he realises and while he looks awake, his brain is pretty much asleep.

“This isn’t his apartment.”

“Where the hell did you take him? He said he was going home!”

The manager turns back to take the wheel and takes the van out of park.

“This is Yunho-ssi’s home.”

—

Yunho cannot summon enough strength to move.

Well, perhaps it is also the dead weight paralysing half his body that might have something to do with that. Even an awake and non-exhausted U-Know Yunho would have some problems with 150 pounds of male pinning him down in an awkward position.

He grunts, trying to half heartedly shove at the body lying on top of him, but the weight does not move.

“Warm…i’m warm…”

It does talk though.

—

Heechul eyes the tangled heap on the couch. Army fatigues contrast with the police uniform. Making a tsking sound, the opportunistic idol lifts his phone to snap a photo.

Yunho cracks open an eye at the clicking sound. He has been awake for a fair few minutes contemplating the predicament he is in and had heard Heechul coming in, but he is loathe to wake the sleepyhead laying extremely uncharacteristically between his legs, curled like a koala facing inwards and using his thigh as his bolster. Half asleep, he considers the full and empty day ahead of him, wondering if they can stay home and watch movies. Something mundane and normal because he misses mundane and normal. He even misses being scolded and nagged which is just plain insane the more he thinks about it.

Nobody in his unit would even dare to _think_ about scolding him, to some extent not even his superiors. They of course expect orders to be followed and all that, and their reprimands if any, are professionally distant.

There is no being nitpicky about the most ridiculous of things.

There is no huffing and puffing in exasperation.

There are no tilted head shakes in disbelief.

There is no affection underlying it all.

He had considered shifting Changmin over the thigh he is hugging when he heard the beeping of the door unlocking but in reality, he has lost all feeling from waist down and even if he tried to get up, he may actually face plant.

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” comes Heechul’s flippant answer, his fingers working over his phone, betraying his lie immediately.

“You better not be sending that to anyone.”

“Not anyone,” Heechul smirks as he finishes his caption and hits send.

_**Service to the Nation or servicing the Nation?** _

The response is not long in coming.

_**If I didn’t know them, I’d say both. You’re not getting a rise out of me, pabo!** _

Heechul’s cackle wakes Changmin, the rumpled officer lifting his head and turning, not to find the source of the sound but to glare accusingly up at his hyung instead. His gorgeous brown eyes, normally filled with various levels of adoration for his hyung, is filled with more than a tinge of irritation. They are mismatched, the way they are when he is genuinely filled with mirth and laughing uproariously, but this time it is merely a side effect of squinting through the crust of his sleep.

“Why does he have the code to your apartment?”

“We’re both serving, yah. I needed someone outside who could come and get my things if I needed it and you didn’t want manager hyung to have it after what happened last time.”

“What happened last time?” Heechul inquires brightly, smirk out in full force.

The maknae turns his attention to the Super Junior visual. The belligerent younger man is still half asleep, he digs his elbow into Yunho’s belly to assist in moving his sleep-stiff body and ignores the grunt from his pillow.

“Nothing dirty, asshole. Now get out,” he growls, the annoyance rings true and clear in his words.

“Changdollie…” Yunho murmurs quietly, because there’s rude and then there’s rude.

“Are you taking his side?” Bambi eyes are now wide open, the haze of sleep still within them and Yunho can see disbelief creeping into those expressive brown eyes, matching the tone of his voice.

Heechul rolls his eyes. He walks to the couch and pats Yunho affectionately on the head. “I don’t know what you do to them to make them turn out like this. The first was definitely a willing party, but this one too?” He laughs when a long limb swipes out to smack him, sidestepping the youngest in the room deftly.

Changmin does not try again, deciding that ignoring is going to be the best policy because Heechul gets a rise out of the reactions more often than not. He turns once again, letting off his annoyance by punching the leather couch with a loud thump, before closing his eyes.

“Did you need something?”

“They know you’re off today and want you at the company. I just wanted to bring a change of clothes in case you were still in camp for some reason.”

‘What time?”

“At noon.”

“What’s the time now?”

Heechul glances at his watch and grins. “Just after six.”

—

“How many times do you need to repeat the whole _Yunho hyung told me if I wanted to quit, I should leave now_ story?”

“But it was relevant!” Changmin argues, matching his hyung’s long strides that get longer when he’s annoyed, forcing the taller man to have to almost jog to keep up.

“So you’re comparing me to your drill sergeant now? And sharing that tasty little anecdote with NCT?” Yunho growls, shaking off Changmin’s hand on his sleeve. They pause at his door while he enters his passcode.

“Well, you have to admit you were quite scary—“

“That’s not the point.” Yunho strides off to his bedroom. trying to slam the door shut to prevent Changmin from entering but the younger man sticks his hand in the door frame and practically yells the entire apartment down when it gets smashed

“You see!?!?! Completely and utterly true!” His voice is shocked and a little pained as he cradles his injured hand to his chest.

“You brought that upon yourself.”

“Fix me!”

“No!”

“Do something, it hurts!”

Yunho lets out a very loud growl, and to Changmin’s further shock, a large hand slams down on his other wrist and he is yanked very forcefully back in the direction they came from. He is manhandled and practically thrown onto the couch before the older man turns to leave immediately without saying another word.

“And he says he isn’t scary?” Still a little shell-shocked, the back of his hand throbbing, the singer turns his attention back to his injury, blowing at the red mark that has bloomed across his hand between his knuckles and his wrist. He moves his hand experimentally and while he still has full function, he cannot extend his hand fully without wincing. He had moved without thinking, and the fault really was his because Yunho had moved to slam the door without looking back, but he cannot help but feel a little sorry for himself.

“Move.”

Changmin looks up, blinking at the older man who is holding an ice pack wrapped with a dishcloth and a cushion in his hand, but he does not question him, moving obediently, mouth opening to say something but thinking better of it.

Yunho settles on the couch, his face a grim mask as he takes in the mark on the other man’s hand. He places the cushion on his lap and takes Changmin’s hand gently, laying it across the cushion and icing it silently.

The silence stretches, filling the room.

The ice melts and the cloth slowly gets soaked, and still neither man speaks.

Whether borne out of sheer stubbornness or simple patience, it really depends on who you ask when both men are still sitting there in silence half an hour later.

“Was I really that bad?”

Changmin looks up from his contemplation of his hand. He had been marvelling at how Yunho knew to wipe away at the condensation so the cushion doesn’t get wet. His hand is numb from the cold and he flexes it experimentally, the pain now more a memory, only a mere shadow of the original left behind.

He shakes his head. “I was just trying to explain to the hoobaes that quitting is never an option and you were the first one who taught me that. You didn’t hear my earlier explanation that both you and that sergeant had the same basic message but the sergeant was hateful about it and took a lot of pleasure in punishing while you only wanted me to be the best that I could be.”

Yunho finally sinks properly against the couch, his body losing the rigidity he had been holding for the past half hour or so. His hand holding the melted ice pack lies limp on the cushion, no longer tending to his younger half’s hand. He had been more than a little hurt coming in at the end of the conversation and hearing himself being compared to a drill sergeant he knew Changmin hated. He should have tried to get the full story but they had spent the whole afternoon at the company when all he wanted was to spend the day at home. So tired and mildly aggravated at his rest day being thwarted, he needed an outlet. He is always thankful to SM Entertainment for their continued support but sometimes his company has the worst possible timing.

Watching his hyung carefully, Changmin takes both pack and cushion, placing the pack on the side table and the cushion next to him. Looping his arm around his hyung’s the way the other usually does to him, he slides down and rests his head on the older man’s shoulder.

“I have to report at 5am.”

“Me too.”

“We’d have to get up before 4.”

“I’ve had less sleep before.”

A slight pause.

“So what do you want to watch?”

**Author's Note:**

> So I actually can’t remember why I didn’t post this when I wrote it cos it was pretty much completed. I just decided to add the gifs. I actually scoured my livejournal and AO3 cos I was sure I posted it but evidently not. So here it is…very belatedly but I guess…timely? Lol :)


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